San Diego  A judge decided Monday to allow a man classified by the state as a sexually violent predator to live in a house in the East County community of Jacumba after he is released from a state hospital.

Mikel Marshall is expected to be at the site — a 14-acre parcel at 42920 Desert Rose Ranch Road near Old Highway 80 — on or before Feb. 10. He will first have to agree to a long list of conditions, including wearing a GPS monitoring device.

As required by law, San Diego Superior Court Judge Howard Shore held a public hearing last month, during which he listened to comments from Jacumba residents who said they did not want Marshall living in their community.

The judge postponed making a final decision, saying he wanted to visit the property and ask other questions of state authorities. On Monday, Shore said he’d had an extensive tour of the interior and exterior of the site.

“I’m pleading with you not to put this man where my children play,” said Merritt Wyeth, a Jacumba resident and mother of three who lives near the house.

“This is not all right,” she said in the courtroom.

Shore acknowledged that he had a tough decision to make and that no matter what he decided, some people would be unhappy. But he said he could not decide the matter based on his feelings as a parent.

Instead, he had to follow the law.

The judge said the only way he could reject the proposal for Marshall would be to find a specific factor that made the site inconsistent with the state’s goal of reintegrating such predators into society. State law allows sexually violent predators to be released from the hospital if they no longer pose a danger.

“Being uncomfortable and not wanting him there is not the same thing as being in danger,” Shore said. “I have no basis on which to reject the proposed placement.”

The judge said he also looked into placing Marshall in a trailer outside Donovan state prison in Otay Mesa, as had been done previously with two other sexually violent predators. None live on that property now.

The judge said he was told by the Department of State Hospitals that neither the piece of land outside the prison nor the trailer were options. The trailer is too dilapidated and the site is too isolated.

Marshall, 39, was convicted of molesting four North County boys in the early 1990s. He spent 14 years in prison before he was determined to fit the predator criteria, as defined by state law, and committed involuntarily to a state hospital.

There, he spent years participating in a program aimed at getting sex offenders to recognize their individual triggers for criminal behavior and work against them.

On Aug. 5, Shore determined that Marshall could be released into the community safely if he continued treatment on an outpatient basis and lived under heavy supervision.